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New York Minimum Wage – (NY Labor Law section 652)

In a prior post, I went over the California statutes that specify the amount of the California state minimum wage. When discussing the minimum wage, remember that it is important to be specific as to which one you’re referring to because the federal government has one as do many of the states. To make things more confusing, depending on the state you’re talking about, many cities also have their own higher minimum wages. In this post, I’m going to go over the statute — section 652 of the New York’s Labor Law — describing the state minimum wage in New York. As it is in California, New York’s minimum wage statute is too long to simply past here verbatim so I’m going to have to paraphrase. Like in California, New York varies it’s minimum wage by both time and the number of employees a particular employer has. New York, however, also varies it’s state minimum wage by county and region. For example, in New York City, Labor Law section 652(1)(a) says the minimum wage for employers with eleven or more employees is: “$11.00 per hour on and after December 31, 2016,   $13.00 per hour on and after December 31, 2017,   $15.00 per hour on and after December 31, 2018, or, if greater, such other wage as may be established by federal law pursuant to 29 U.S.C. section 206 or its successors or such other wage as may be established in accordance with the provisions of this article.” For New York City employers with fewer than eleven employees, the minimum wage is:  “$10.50 per hour on and after December...

California Minimum Wage – (CA Labor Code section 1182.12)

A lot of my ideas for blog posts come from topics I encounter while doing research on something else, usually a case I’m working on. In this post, I’m going to go over one of those topics — namely, the statute in California where the amount of the minimum wage is set. Much is said about the minimum age normally (e.g. it hasn’t gone up in X years, etc), particularly now. As I write this, it is mid-May 2020 and many people — at least a few earning minimum wage — are out of work or have been out of work for the last several weeks due to corona virus. When discussing the minimum wage, it’s important to be clear about which one applies. The federal government has one. Many states (e.g. California) have one. Many cities within a state also have one. For example, the city of San Jose, CA has a local ordinance ( San Jose Ordinance # 298929) specifying the minimum wage as $15.25 as of May 14, 2020. Many other cities in the vicinity of San Jose, CA also have higher minimum wages than what the state of California requires. In California, the statute that describes the amount of the minimum wage if California Labor Code section 1182.12. That statute is fairly long so I can’t paste the entire thing here. There’s a lot that goes over a lot of math and other computations that needs to be done. The parts that I’m guessing most of you will be interested in is where the actual values of the minimum wage are specified. That’s in section...